16th Transatlantic Forum

"The Art of the Possible: Striking a Balance between Participation and the Delegation of Power"

Pirates in state parliaments, enraged citizens on the street, and California as an ungovernable state – political participation manifests itself in unexpected, and polarizing, ways. The only thing that’s clear is that no government and no political party, and perhaps no business company either, is able to get around participatory possibilities.

During the 16th Transatlantic Forum (starting today!), we want to explore what these possibilities may look like, how to mobilize those parts of the population that make no use of the already existing instruments, and to what extent a shift towards increased participation is also reflected in the business and economic sector.

Dinner SpeechThe Evolution of Democracy – How Will Political Participation Look Tomorrow?Craig Calhoun Designated Director, London School of Economics and Political Science, London

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Craig Calhoun said that civil protests had to overcome their skeptical attitude towards
institution building. Without institutional structures they wouldn’t be able
to make their issues heard and to shape social change.

Day 2: Theorizing about participation...

Panel Session 1 New Forms of Democracy – Benefiting the Minority at the Expense of the Majority?

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Highlights:

Anke Domscheit-Berg: “The future of government is transparency. As a result, secrecy and
corruption will have a harder time in digital democracies. Ideally, open government
happens top down. Governments who don’t open up will be made transparent bottom
up.”

John Kornblum: “Community organizing helps to increase transparency and provides the
possibility of participation, and thus empowers citizens to decide their own
fate. It is not about minorities. It's all a question of empowerment
only.”

Sudha David-Wilp: “Within the current US political system, the lack of bipartisanship and
will to cooperate leads to political apathy and distrust of government in the
American electorate.”

Panel Session 2The Professional Citizen – An Equal Partner in Business and Politics?

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Highlights:

Marianne Wellershoff argued that employees who profit directly from the financial success of their
company as shareholders were more motivated and entrepreneurial. While they can vote for representatives, employees of Der Spiegel news magazine are not involved in business decisions.

David Howard: “The level of exposure caused by the demand for transparency and direct
communication through e-mail, phone, fax, Facebook, Twitter and other forms of
communication poses a tremendous load on elected officials, which makes it even
more difficult to do the job well.”

...and getting in touch with local initiatives.

How to Include Minorities in Participatory ProcessesCommunity Platform Wedding Moabit: “Wir sind da!”

John Kornblum: “Community organizing is a slow revolution, a grassroots level
empowerment, on the basis of talking.”

Surprising information: the high workload of
the members of the Petition Committee, the relatively high success rate (about
40% are debated in parliament, 5% of petitions are successful) and the fact that the implementation of e-petitions did not lead to an increase in the overall
number of petitions.

As for Liquid Democracy, participants gained insights
into the application of the participation software which is not limited to
political purposes. Another interesting fact is that, in Germany
today, two participation tools compete with each other, representing two different
ideas of political participation.